A Season 3 Horror Story
by Besina
Summary: The Coat and Scarf have come through the hiatus unscathed, but what happened to everything else? A darkly cracky horror story. No blood or gore, just spooky; it'll leave your fibres standing on end. Angst, suspense, comfort, friendship, psychological horror, mystery, crack


Written by Besina  
January 13, 2014 (When the frak did that happen? isn't it supposed to be 2009, still?)

This is a stand-alone, but it helps if you've read "The Reason for Drycleaners" first, to understand the dynamic. And yes, this is what happens when I start wondering where certain things have gone... figures that this would be my first post-s3 fic...

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It was late at night, the telly had just been turned off and the jumper had taken its wearer out the door and, presumably, to its new home.

The coat gave a small shiver.

"What's wrong?" asked the scarf, slithering down a little from its higher peg to rest around its shoulders.

"Um..." the coat began, then shivered again.

"It's not like you to get scared. And don't give me that 'it's cold' line either, we both know that doesn't work."

The coat swallowed again, then tried for a hushed whisper. "Haven't you noticed anything wrong since he came back?"

The scarf lifted one end and scrunched its tassels at it curiously. "Well, the blood and dry-cleaners were no fun, and when he returned there certainly were an awful lot of rows for a very long time with everyone he came across, but... no... not exactly anything _wrong_."

_"Then where are the dressing gowns?"_ the coat hissed. "I know I didn't like them very much, especially that swishy blue one that always demanded so much attention, but where are they _now?"_

The scarf looked around briefly - it hadn't actually noticed they were gone. "There's still some unpacking left to do, they're probably still in one of the boxes," it tried.

"It's been _three months!"_ the coat exclaimed in a loud whisper, "You know how often he wore them! They should have been amongst the first things to be unpacked! And have you not noticed that he seems to have acquired a _new_ one? He doesn't look like he's even searching for the other two anymore. He wears it about every day... and..." the coat gulped again, "I think there's something _wrong_ with it."

The scarf balled itself up on one shoulder, feeling slightly more secure than it had draped willy-nilly behind the coat's collar - a perch it had liked, but which now suddenly made it feel exposed and vulnerable. Maybe the coat was just telling ghost stories... trying to get it all worked up over nothing. Then again... "What do you mean?" it asked, sotto-voce.

"Well, for starters, it's _beige_."

"You can hardly fault it for being beige."

"True, but it seems to delight in _being_ beige, as if it helps it blend in - be unassuming: unnoticeable, when that's all a front - I don't think it's _actually_ beige at all."

"Are you suggesting it has chameleon powers?" scoffed the scarf.

"Dunno," replied the coat, in all sincerity, "but there's something off about it." It thought for a second then continued, "Then there's the fact it doesn't swoop, twirl or float when he turns - _at all!_ It just hangs there, heavy and, I swear: menacing. It's up to no good. It tries to hide in plain sight. It has no _flair_. Which is odd for a garment of _his_ isn't it? And he hasn't seemed to _notice_. He doesn't even seem to notice how often he wears it, and he certainly was aware of the _others_. He wore them to _great_ dramatic effect.

"Now_ it's_ here, the first- and second-best dressing gowns have mysteriously gone missing, and I swear that thing is _evil_. It's plotting something, mark my words. I may have not been overly-fond of the others, who were the worst sort of attention-hounds..."

"You're one to talk," teased the scarf, seeking to break the uneasy tension in the room.

"but at least they had no hidden agendas... I have no idea what this... _can you even call it a 'dressing gown'?_... is up to. Not to mention, I've heard the flannel sobbing for weeks."

The scarf mulled this over for a minute or two, curling in on itself a little tighter with each passing moment. The air had seemed to take on a more definite chill, and the more the scarf thought through the coat's words, the more ominous things started to seem.

What if other garments went missing? Sherlock was very attached to him and the scarf, after all. Would they simply disappear one day too, so the new robe could fully assert its control? If there were a hit list, surely they now ranked at the top...

"Um..." the scarf tapped lightly on the coat's shoulder.

The coat raised a buttonhole at it.

"Can I maybe... sleep _inside_ your collar tonight?" It asked, trying hard not to sound shaken.

"Sure," the coat soothed, knowing full-well it would be providing protection, but welcoming another garment to hold tight. "We'll try to spread the word to the hat and skull tomorrow, and we'll see if we can't get a message to the linens somehow. Til then, we'll just have to sit tight and wait."

Maybe... maybe if they were lucky, next time the shooting jacket and jumper were over, they could send some sort of signal...

The scarf wriggled itself just inside the coat's collar and spread out along it, feeling safer, while the coat drew itself together protectively. Perhaps they'd been exposed to too much telly that night, but, thought the coat ominously, the night _was_ long...and full of terrors...

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Comments please! I live and breathe for comments! :) Thanks! You can now follow me on Tumblr as well (since FF doesn't support links, I'm besinaao3 over there.)

And yes, kudos to you if you got that last reference. :)


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